Daniel Johnson
  Sports Editor

 

In 1967, French literary critic and theorist published the essay “The Death of the Author”. The main point of the essay was to call to an end of taking in part the personal life and beliefs of an author when looking at his works. Good or bad art can come from good or bad people. And when thinking about the music, television, movies, books, art, etc I enjoy, it always does not come the most moral people in the world.

 

I enjoy listening to Phil Spector’s, James Brown’s and Michael Jackson’s music, though Brown has been arrested multiple times for domestic violence and spent years in jail for leading police on a high speed chase, assault, and theft, Jackson has been accused of child molestation with suitable evidence against him, and Spector is currently in jail for second degree murder. Both director Roman Polanski and singer R Kelly have had successful careers after rumors and evidence (in the case of Polanki, a guilty conviction) of engaging in sexual acts with minors. All these men have since been honored, celebrated, awarded accolades and praise, and we seem to forgiven or at least devalue their alleged crimes. But why after all of that, I’m still repulsed by Joe Paterno Day at Penn State.

 

In honor of the anniversary for his first coached game back in 1966, Penn State honored the late Joe Paterno on September 17th’s home game against Temple. However, Joe Paterno has been a pariah in the sporting world since 2012, when his former longtime assistant coach, Jerry Sandusky, was convicted of being a serial child molester who was convicted for sexually abusing 10 boys and founded guilty of 45 of the 48 charges levied against him. During the investigation, evidence found that Paterno, other coaches, and school officials knew of Sandusky’s actions for years.

 

According to the grand jury testimony, back in 2001 former assistant coach Mike McQueary told Paterno and university officials he witnessed Sandusky raping a young boy in the shower. This past July, more court documents were released that included one of Sandusky’s victims, called “John Doe 150” reported his rape to Paterno back in 1976. According to John Doe, Paterno replied that “I don’t want to hear about any of that kind of stuff, I have a football season to worry about” then walked away.

 

You know, when Penn State fans protested and held support signs outside of Paterno’s house after he got rightfully fired when the scandal broke, I chalked that up to kids not having all the details, getting emotional, and wanting their old grandpa back. That was 2011. It’s 2016 now. Was Joe Paterno a good football coach? No, he was a great football coach! One of the best of all time without a doubt. But you know what, my dad calls OJ Simpson and Walter Payton the two greatest running backs he ever saw, and I say that Simpsons’ 1973 season when he rushed for 2,003 yards the best performance of any running back. But if the Buffalo Bills decided to have a OJ Simpson Day five years after the Trial of the Century, then the PR Director of the Bills’ career would be as dead as OJ’s post 1995.

 

The entire death of the artist mindset goes out the window when the reason for your inaction is to preserve your own legacy and the football program that took precedent in your mind over protecting innocent children. I can listen to James Brown and Michael Jackson with a clear conscious because what they were accused of did not have direct ties to their music. Even with artists such as Jay Z and The Notorious BIG, who discussed their past lives of drug dealing in their songs, that can be seen more as a crime of survival. As the opening lines of “Juicy” says,

 

“to all the people that lived above the buildings that I was hustlin’ in front of that called the police on me when I was just tryin’ to make some money to feed my daughter”

 

In the case of Joe Paterno, to protect his own legacy and the program, he choose to protect a serial rapist. There is nothing that the Paterno Family, Penn State, or anyone can say or do to convince anyone with any minimum knowledge of the events that can look at Paterno and only see a great head coach. It was a heat of the moment mistake like with Woody Hayes at Ohio State hitting a player during a game or even academic/financial violations like with Pete Carroll at USC or Jim Boeheim at Syracuse, this was Paterno allowing a monster lurk around his university for, at least a decade, at most since the mid 1970s.

 

Today, I can watch Penn State football fine. I can watch past Penn State games. But no, celebrating Joe Paterno in any way, shape, or form, I can’t do that.